Director: Loïc Espuche
At summer camp, every kid mocks the couples whose lips go pink and glossy when they kiss, until young Léo notices his own mouth starting to do the exact same thing.
What is Yuck! about?
"Yuck!" is a short French animated film set at a children's summer camp, where kissing between grown-ups is treated as something gross and slightly ridiculous, complete with a telltale shine that appears on lips right before a kiss happens. Léo joins in the teasing along with the rest of the campers, laughing at the older couples sneaking off together. But he's hiding something: his own lips have started to glisten too, a sign he can't explain to anyone and definitely doesn't want his friends to notice. Underneath the joke, the film quietly follows Léo working up the nerve to admit that he actually wants to try kissing himself, even though doing so would mean crossing over into the very thing he's spent the whole summer mocking. It's a tender, funny look at first crushes told entirely from a child's perspective.
Cast & crew
The voice cast is led by young performer Noé Chabbat as Léo, alongside Katell Varvat, Enzo Desmedt, Camille Bouisson, Hugo Chauvel, Roman Freud, and Mattias Marcussy as fellow campers. Loïc Espuche directs, working in a hand-drawn animation style that keeps the tone light even as the story edges toward something more sincere.
Context & significance
Made in 2024 and running just 14 minutes, "Yuck!" belongs to the animation, comedy, and romance space and comes from France. Its short runtime lets it stay focused on a single summer and a single secret, which suits the simplicity of its premise well. The film picked up festival attention for turning a familiar playground joke into a small, sincere story about growing up, without ever losing its light, comic touch along the way.
Where & how to watch
"Yuck!" is available to stream on K-Time with a free account login, on a platform built around a Farsi interface for Persian-speaking audiences. This page can be read without an account; watching only requires that quick, no-cost sign-up.